Brooklyn native Charles Randolph discovered the spirit of old Brooklyn in Ladispoli, Italy
Brooklynites in Rome
Charles Randolph was born in 1944 at 856 East 15th Street between Avenues I and H in Flatbush. He lived there until he went to graduate school at NYU to study dentistry. He is a Brooklyn College alum with a BS in Chemistry. Randolph has maintained his dental practice in Westchester County since 1971.
In the late 1980s, as part of a deal between the New York and Italian Trade Commissions, he commuted to a dental clinic in the Parioli section of Metropolitan Rome to help patients with TMJ (jaw bone joint) issues and orthopedic training.
Eventually, Randolph bought a home in Ladispoli, a town in the Province of Rome about 25 miles west of Central Rome, on the Mediterranean Sea.
Later, after his divorce, when Randolph planned to sell his Italian home, a group of local Italian friends converted a small shack on the edge of an olive grove into a one-bedroom apartment in a successful attempt to give Randolph a reason to keep a residence there and return to the small Mediterranean town. It was during the time he spent at his apartment in Ladispoli that Randolph learned to harvest olives and make olive oil.
Randolph also started his own Mobile Dental Service here in the states that caters to the poor communities in upstate New York and drug rehab centers in Brooklyn, providing dental service to poor people who otherwise could not afford quality dental care.
In a recent interview with the Brooklyn Eagle, Randolph talked about his career as a Westchester County dentist, his childhood in an all Italian neighborhood in Flatbush, and the time he has spent, and still spends today, in a small, beautiful Italian town on the Mediterranean.
BE: Did you have a lot of high-profile clients as a dentist in Westchester County?